New York —The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) remains one of the most highly rated development aid organisations in the world, according to a new survey of nearly 3,500 leaders in the world’s developing nations.

The findings come in a new report, Listening to Leaders 2018, by AidData, a research lab at William & Mary, a public research university in Virginia. The report finds that developing world leaders give their highest marks for helpfulness and influence to multilateral aid agencies, including UNDP.

“UNDP values its role as a trusted partner to nations across the world as they work towards achieving their development goals. We are grateful for their assessment of UNDP’s work,” said UNDP Administrator Achim Steiner.

“We are honoured to be among the organisations leaders found most influential and helpful, and we look forward to continuing our critical role in helping to keep people out of poverty through development that includes everyone and protects the planet.”

AidData benchmarked 35 donors on the two indicators of performance: influence in shaping in-country policy priorities, and helpfulness in implementing policies.

It found that UNDP was ranked as one of the top 10 development partners on both indicators: perceived influence, where it moved from ninth in 2014 to seventh in the new report; and perceived helpfulness, where it moved from 15th to 10th. The latter category is based on the number of partners rated as “quite” or “very” helpful in the survey.

In 2017, AidData contacted 46,688 individuals in 126 low- and lower-middle-income countries and across 22 policy domains (including health, finance, agriculture, water and education) who had served during the period 2010-2015. The researchers asked leaders what they think are the most important policy challenges for their countries to solve, the blockers and enablers to progress, and how they assess the contributions of the international donors with which they work. A total of 3,468 individuals responded to the survey.

In 2016, the prestigious Aid Transparency Index recognised UNDP as the leading aid organisation among 46 international agencies, representing 98 per cent of Official Development Flows. The index was produced by Publish What You Fund, a non-profit organisation that advocates for and measures transparency.